Posts Tagged ‘fantasy’
Posted by jamesviscosi on June 18, 2013
This week’s Teaser Tuesday is from Haunted House, by J.A. Konrath and Jack Kilborn (who, despite having different names, are in fact the same person, unlike, say, “Simon & Simon”, who had the same name but were different people). The setup is that a number of characters from previous books by the same author have been brought together in a house where, apparently, everything is trying to kill them. If that sounds a bit “Saw”-ish to you then, well, I’ll have to take your word for it, because I have never seen a “Saw” movie. But it does sort of sound like what I imagine a “Saw” movie might involve.
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Posted in Excerpts, fantasy, horror, Teaser Tuesday, Writing | Tagged: animal house, fantasy, haunted house, horror, j.a. konrath, jack kilborn, saw, shards, teaser tuesday, the war of the ravels, writing | 1 Comment »
Posted by jamesviscosi on June 11, 2013
Since last week I featured a rejection letter from Tom Piccirilli’s old magazine “Pirate Writings”, I was inspired to get around to reading his book The Last Kind Words (currently available for the Kindle for $0.99). I haven’t read any of Tom Piccirilli’s work since A Choir of Ill Children, which is one of my favorite book names, though All Heads Turn When The Hunt Goes By still holds the position of Best Title Ever. But I digress.
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Posted in fantasy, horror, science fiction, Teaser Tuesday | Tagged: beyond the sea, brad dourif, Excerpts, fantasy, horror, river song, shards, spoilers, the last kind words, the war of the ravels, the x-files, tom piccirilli | 1 Comment »
Posted by jamesviscosi on May 28, 2013
This week I’m still reading Peter F. Hamilton’s The Dreaming Void, part one of his “Void” trilogy. At 90% through, the faithful still haven’t gotten their ships built yet for launching their pilgrimage to the Void, which will either (1) take them to an Elysian realm of eternal life and happiness or (2) cause the Void to wake up and devour the galaxy. I’m betting it won’t be (1).
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Posted in fantasy, science fiction, Teaser Tuesday | Tagged: commonewealth saga, fantasy, milky way, peter f. hamilton, science fiction, shards, the dreaming void, the war of the ravels, void | 1 Comment »
Posted by jamesviscosi on May 21, 2013
This week I’m almost halfway through Peter F. Hamilton’s The Dreaming Void, part one of his “Void” trilogy, in which humanity discovers that what they thought was a black hole at the center of the Milky Way galaxy is, in fact, some sort of ancient, gigantic artifact that periodically wakes up and eats nearby stars. So of course, somebody decides they have to send a ship into it. Readers of Hamilton’s earlier “Commonwealth Sage”, in whose universe the “Void” trilogy is set, will remember how well it turned out the last time humans sent ships poking around such a construct. (Hint: Not well.) Like most of Hamilton’s books, this one is taking a nice long time to get going, but, also like most of Hamilton’s books, I expect that once the plot really kicks in, I won’t want to put it down.
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Posted in fantasy, science fiction, Teaser Tuesday | Tagged: commonewealth saga, fantasy, milky way, peter f. hamilton, science fiction, shards, the dreaming void, the war of the ravels, void | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jamesviscosi on April 16, 2013
This month’s free Prime book is Oz Reimagined: New Tales from the Emerald City and Beyond, a collection of short stories inspired by, you guessed it, the Oz stories of L. Frank Baum. Not just based on the characters from the Wizard of Oz, the stories includes Ozma, the Gump, Jack Pumpkinhead, and others. The collection has a foreword by Gregory Maguire of Wicked fame, which should tell you that you are in for some revisionism. As in this story, “Off to See the Emperor”, by Orson Scott Card, in which six-year-old Frank Baum and nine-year-old Theodora are trying to get Theodora’s mother’s ring back, and the Lion is being less than helpful about it.
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Posted in fantasy, Teaser Tuesday | Tagged: elves, Excerpts, fantasy, gregory maguire, oz, oz reimagined, shards, teaser tuesday, the war of the ravels, wicked | 1 Comment »
Posted by jamesviscosi on April 2, 2013
I’m between books at the moment, having finished off Wool and not picked up a replacement yet, so rather than Teaser Tuesday, this week I offer another side-by-side comparison of a scene from The War of the Ravels. In this scene, Our Heroes meet a fellow named Brennendah, of the same species (“Rittandic”) as the villain of the piece, Kihantroh. As usual, the original, 20-year-old version of the scene is on the left, while the rewritten version is on the right.
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Posted in Excerpts, fantasy, Teaser Tuesday, Writing | Tagged: changes, Excerpts, fantasy, reading the old version is kind of painful, revisions, shards, the war of the ravels | 1 Comment »
Posted by jamesviscosi on March 26, 2013
This week I’m still working on Wool: Omnibus Edition by Hugh Howey, the dystopian SF novel from last week. This is a big book and well worth the $3.99 Kindle price. It still mostly takes place in that giant silo (“They mostly stay in the silo. Mostly.”), and at this point my speculation last week that the title, which seemed to refer to the wool pads use to scrub sensors, might also refer to the old saw about “pulling the wool over one’s eyes” has been explicitly stated. Five points for me!
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Posted in fantasy, science fiction, Teaser Tuesday | Tagged: dystopias, Excerpts, fantasy, Hugh Howey, indie books, it, science fiction, shards, the war of the ravels, wastelands, wool | 2 Comments »
Posted by jamesviscosi on March 19, 2013
So having run out of free books, I have shelled out the princely sum of $3.99 for Wool: Omnibus Edition by Hugh Howey, a dystopian SF novel that, so far, takes place entirely in a giant underground silo in which the remnants of humanity eke out an existence, while outside, the earth is a lifeless world beneath a toxic atmospheric stew. At the moment the title appears to refer to the wool pads used by convicts (or the occasional volunteer) who goes out into the poisonous world to scrub the sensors and cameras that allow those within the silo to look out at the wasteland they have left behind, but I’m thinking it also refers to the wool being pulled over everyone’s eyes, perhaps by the silo’s IT Department. We shall see!
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Posted in fantasy, science fiction, Teaser Tuesday | Tagged: dystopias, Excerpts, fantasy, Hugh Howey, indie books, it, science fiction, shards, the war of the ravels, wastelands, wool | 1 Comment »
Posted by jamesviscosi on March 12, 2013
Another month, another free book from the Kindle Owner’s Lending Library! This week it’s Bottled Abyss by Benjamin Kane Ethridge, in which a bottle containing the waters of the River Styx finds its way into mortal hands. Needless to say, hilarity ensues.
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Posted in fantasy, horror, science fiction, Teaser Tuesday | Tagged: american gods, benjamin kane ethridge, bottled abyss, Excerpts, fantasy, horror, neil gaiman, shards, styx, the war of the ravels | 1 Comment »
Posted by jamesviscosi on March 5, 2013
At the moment I’m between books, having finished the last one and not picked a new one yet, so there’s no Teaser Tuesday for the week. Instead I reached into my vast pile of rejection letters and pulled out this one, from The JABberwocky Agency, for a book that you may have seen mentioned here once or twice …
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Posted in Book Sales, fantasy, Lulu, Writing | Tagged: #1, bestsellers, dragon stones, fantasy, hard shell word factory, jabberwocky agency, kindle, literary agents, Lulu, mundania, rejection letters | 2 Comments »